April 18, 1:30 p.m.: “Cultivating Peace and Justice,” Jenny Craig Pavilion, University of San Diego

April 19, 9:30 a.m.: “Upholding Universal Ethics and Compassion in Challenging Times,” Viejas Arena, San Diego State University

Tickets: Tickets to each event will be $10 for the host campus’ students, $25 for others. Ticket sales will begin Feb. 22 at dalailamasandiego.org; The site will be accessible to the public after today’s 10 a.m. news conference.

Uniting their forces, three local universities are bringing the Dalai Lama to San Diego in April for a series of talks on topics ranging from global climate change to religious harmony. This will be the spiritual leader’s first official visit to San Diego.

“I see this as a historic event for the people of San Diego — and the world,” said Lama Tenzin Dhonden, an aide to the Dalai Lama, who helped arrange the “Compassion Without Borders” symposium at the University of California San Diego, the University of San Diego and San Diego State University.

Dhonden — whose official title is “personal peace emissary” for the Dalai Lama — and representatives from all three schools will officially announce this visit during a news conference this morning at the Manchester Grand Hyatt.

Tenzin Gyatso is the 14th Dalai Lama, the supreme religious head of Tibet. He has lived in India since 1959, having fled his native land after Chinese troops defeated rebels trying to establish an independent Tibet. Now 76, the Dalai Lama remains a prolific writer — his most recent book, “Beyond Religion: Ethics for a Whole World,” was published in December — and still spends up to 10 months a year on the road.

The 1989 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, he has addressed the U.S. Congress, the United Nations, the European Parliament and universities from Mexico to Australia.

He’s also a pop culture force, followed by celebrities and more than 3.4 million people on Twitter. Yet the Dalai Lama has never been to San Diego, outside of a brief stop more than 20 years ago to meet privately with local Buddhist monks.

His April visit will be the second stop in a 12-day North American tour, which will begin in Hawaii and include events in Los Angeles; Rochester, Minn.; and Canada.

“But San Diego will be — I think — the most important stop,” said Dhonden, who schedules many of these visits. “This will be his first time making a public appearance in San Diego and many people here have not met the Dalai Lama or had an opportunity to attend his talks.”

The Dalai Lama will arrive in San Diego on April 17. The next morning, he will join two experts from UC San Diego — Richard Somerville and Veerabhadran Ramanathan — for a panel discussion about climate change. At a private lunch on that campus, he will reflect on neuroscience’s lessons on consciousness and compassion. That afternoon, he will speak on “Cultivating Peace and Justice” at USD, where he will receive the San Diego Medal of Peace.

His final event here will be an April 19 speech, “Upholding Universal Ethics and Compassion in Challenging Times,” at SDSU.

Following the panel discussion and both public speeches, the Dalai Lama will entertain questions from the audience.

This visit took more than a year to organize. “In part,” said Pamela Gray Payton, an assistant vice president at USD, “that’s because everything has been thought out. You ask Lama Tenzin a question and he really has to consider it from all angles, think about what the Dalai Lama would want.”

Another complication: logistics. The U.S. State Department is helping coordinate this visit, and invitations to the talks are being sent to Gov. Jerry Brown, U.S. Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer as well as local dignitaries.

Supporters of the Dalai Lama regard him as a living saint whose message transcends national and sectarian borders.

His talks here “will bring together people from different faiths, secularists and non-secularists, scientists and nonscientists, to celebrate our shared values,” Dhonden said. “These are the internal values of humanity, or you could also say the goodness of humanity.”

His appearances, though, sometimes attract protesters who echo China’s official position, that the Dalai Lama’s primary goal is to liberate Tibet from Beijing’s grasp. Even as Dhonden was finalizing the Dalai Lama’s San Diego plans this week, Chinese officials were reiterating the communist government’s opposition — “without exception” — to his international appearances.

While acknowledging these tensions, Dhonden said they have nothing to do with the Dalai Lama’s appearance. “This is not a political visit,” he said.

The April visit, though, does represent a small personal triumph for Dhonden. While spending most of each year traveling on the Dalai Lama’s behalf, he moved to San Diego 10 years ago at the behest of local Buddhists.

“I have been bringing His Holiness to many states and ignoring the place where I live,” he said. “So I’ve become very strong, very committed, to bringing His Holiness here.”